Email this article to a friend

It's rare for privileged Westerners to see, graphically, what many others experience daily--for example, in a remote village in Yemen.

April is usually a cheerful month in New England, with the first signs of spring, and the harsh winter at last receding. Not this year.

There are few in Boston who were not touched in some way by the marathon bombings on April 15 and the tense week that followed. Several friends of mine were at the finish line when the bombs went off. Others live close to where Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, the second suspect, was captured. The young police officer Sean Collier was murdered right outside my office building.

It's rare for privileged Westerners to see, graphically, what many others experience daily—for example, in a remote village in Yemen, the same week as the marathon bombings.

On April 23, Yemeni activist and journalist Farea Al-Muslimi, who had studied at an American high school, testified before a U.S. Senate committee that right after the marathon bombings, a drone strike in his home village in Yemen killed its target.

The strike terrorized the villagers, turning them into enemies of the United States—something that years of jihadi propaganda had failed to accomplish. His neighbors had admired the U.S., Al-Muslimi told the committee, but “Now, however, when they think of America, they think of the fear they feel at the drones over their heads. What radicals had previously failed to achieve in my village, one drone strike accomplished in an instant.”

Rack up another triumph for President Obama's global assassination program, which creates hatred of the United States and threats to its citizens more rapidly than it kills people who are suspected of posing a possible danger to us someday.

The target of the Yemeni village assassination—which was carried out to induce maximum terror in the population—was well-known and could easily have been apprehended, Al-Muslimi said. This is another familiar feature of the global terror operations.

There was no direct way to prevent the Boston murders. There are some easy ways to prevent likely future ones: by not inciting them. That's also true of another case of a suspect murdered, his body disposed of without autopsy, when he could easily have been apprehended and brought to trial: Osama bin Laden.

This murder too had consequences. To locate bin Laden, the CIA launched a fraudulent vaccination campaign in a poor neighborhood, then switched it, uncompleted, to a richer area where the suspect was thought to be.

The CIA operation violated fundamental principles as old as the Hippocratic oath. It also endangered health workers associated with a polio vaccination program in Pakistan, several of whom were abducted and killed, prompting the U.N. to withdraw its anti-polio team.

The CIA ruse also will lead to the deaths of unknown numbers of Pakistanis who have been deprived of protection from polio because they fear that foreign killers may still be exploiting vaccination programs.

Columbia University health scientist Leslie Roberts estimated that 100,000 cases of polio may follow this incident; he told Scientific American that “people would say this disease, this crippled child is because the U.S. was so crazy to get Osama bin Laden.”

And they may choose to react, as aggrieved people sometimes do, in ways that will cause their tormentors consternation and outrage.

Even more severe consequences were narrowly averted. The U.S. Navy SEALs were under orders to fight their way out if necessary. Pakistan has a well-trained army, committed to defending the state. Had the invaders been confronted, Washington would not have left them to their fate. Rather, the full force of the U.S. killing machine might have been used to extricate them, quite possibly leading to nuclear war.

There is a long and highly instructive history showing the willingness of state authorities to risk the fate of their populations, sometimes severely, for the sake of their policy objectives, not least the most powerful state in the world. We ignore it at our peril.

In chilling detail, Scahill describes the effects on the ground of U.S. military operations, terror strikes from the air (drones), and the exploits of the secret army of the executive branch, the Joint Special Operations Command, which rapidly expanded under President George W. Bush, then became a weapon of choice for President Obama.

We should bear in mind an astute observation by the author and activist Fred Branfman, who almost single-handedly exposed the true horrors of the U.S. “secret wars” in Laos in the 1960s, and their extensions beyond.

Considering today's JSOC-CIA-drones/killing machines, Branfman reminds us about the Senate testimony in 1969 of Monteagle Stearns, U.S. deputy chief of mission in Laos from 1969 to 1972.

Asked why the U.S. rapidly escalated its bombing after President Johnson had ordered a halt over North Vietnam in November 1968, Stearns said, “Well, we had all those planes sitting around and couldn't just let them stay there with nothing to do”—so we can use them to drive poor peasants in remote villages of northern Laos into caves to survive, even penetrating within the caves with our advanced technology.

JSOC and the drones are a self-generating terror machine that will grow and expand, meanwhile creating new potential targets as they sweep much of the world. And the executive won't want them just “sitting around.”

It wouldn't hurt to contemplate another slice of history, at the dawn of the 20th century.

In his book Policing America's Empire: The United States, the Philippines and the Rise of the Surveillance State, the historian Alfred McCoy explores in depth the U.S. pacification of the Philippines after an invasion that killed hundreds of thousands through savagery and torture.

The conquerors established a sophisticated surveillance and control system, using the most advanced technology of the day to ensure obedience, with consequences for the Philippines that reach to the present.

And as McCoy demonstrates, it wasn't long before the successes found their way home, where such methods were employed to control the domestic population—in softer ways to be sure, but not very attractive ones.

We can expect the same. The dangers of unexamined and unregulated monopoly power, particularly in the state executive, are hardly news. The right reaction is not passive acquiescence.

Noam Chomsky is Institute Professor and Professor of Linguistics (Emeritus) at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and the author of dozens of books on U.S. foreign policy. His most recent book is Who Rules the World? from Metropolitan Books.

Of course it does matter. If it was an inside job, why would the perpetrators bother to cover it up? Is it OK for members of the government to kill citizens and then blame that on "terrorist" so that they can invade the country where these "terrorists" are hiding? Come on, do you or Prof Chomsky really believe your own words?

If the American public knows it is an inside job, that is their own government was responsible for 911, they would demand justice. That would destroy both the Republic and Democratic parties as well as the whole corporate structure who uses the two party system for their own financial gain and to control the American public. This includes Wall Street, the Federal Reserve, the arms industry and others.

On an international level, Afghanistan & Iraq would demand justice and compensation. Please bare in mind that Germany is still paying for the crimes committed by the Nazis. And that one of the reasons Hitler came to power was the reparations that Germany had to pay to the Allies for their role in WW1. So if the USA have to pay for reparations to Afghanistan and Iraq, it will have a huge impact on the economy of the USA. And would the American public want to pay for this from their own hard-earned tax dollars after their own government (both Bush and Obama regimes) lied to them? No they would want to. And if they are clever, they would rather let the companies who directly gained from 911 and the wars that followed, pay for the reparations. And of course, the personal fortunes of all the government officials and politicians involved in the actual crime and the covering up of it. And all the owners of the mass media propaganda machine who covered up these crimes.

The people who was responsible for committing the crimes and covering them up, would definitely not want the American public and all other countries on earth to know that they committed 911. The only way they can then remain in power is to install a global dictatorship. Or their power structure will be dismantled. That will be the end of them. Pedro, can you and Prof Chomsky not see this? Or is their grip on global power so strong that even if the truth came out, they will still remain in power. Why would they cover it up in the first place? It takes a lot more energy to govern though terror than it takes to do it through deceit.

Of course, both you and Prof Chomsky believe the conspiracy theory that Osama Bin Laden and Al-Qaeda was responsible for 911. You would probably base your belief on the flawed reports from NIST & 911 Commission. Prof Chomsky often comments that people who believed that the Twin Towers came down due to controlled demolition, should publish their findings in peer-reviewed scientific journals. He doesn't demand the same from NIST. [And please, don't believe that peer-reviewed scientific journal are immune to political and financial pressures]. The theory that the temperature created by the fires in the buildings caused ALL the central steel pillars and all the horizontal steel beams to weaken so that the mass of the top floors could cause the rest of the building to collapse at free fall, cannot be proven. And no-one has published any evidence in a peer-reviewed magazine. Firstly, if the central pillars were weakened, they will just sag or be distorted as the mass of the floors and other steel beams pull them down. Or they will collapse sideways. But these massive steel columns would have still been visible. Steel will bend, maybe break, but will not be just collapse except if caused to do so by explosives. And the mass of the top floors is spread out, so they would never be able to cause the floors below to collapse at free-fall. These steel beams were never examined scientifically to determine exactly how they collapsed. They were shipped off to China and other unknown places, not stored as evidence for a proper criminal investigation based on scientific facts!

The best reason for Prof Chomsky's myopic views is that it fits in with his theories that the USA government's foreign policy is causing a back-lash and an increase terrorism and also probably a misplaced belief that these terrorist are valiantly fighting back against the biggest global empire ever with probably the biggest and most sophisticated military in global history. The worst reason is that he is part of the ruling cabal and plays the role of dividing and manipulating the internal opposition to the US government and their puppeteers. Here is the man who co-wrote the book "Manufacturing Consent". The story of 911 is the perfect casebook example of Manufactured Consent through one of the most sophisticated national and global propaganda machines that ever existed. Did Prof Chomsky write that book as a manual for the oppressors or to expose them? It seems that he either forgot what he wrote or that my first proposition is true.

Posted by Tertius Wehmeyer on 2014-03-10 06:56:51

You're missing the point of his message, which is always the same:We should be more concerned with the evil that we participate in and pay for, as compared to things out of our control.

Posted by joeblow on 2013-05-24 09:40:24

Of course it doesn't matter. If it was indeed an inside job, the results would have likely been the same as if it wasn't, policy-wise, which is not the same as saying you shouldn't find out if it was or wasn't an inside job. However, basing your entire argument on dubious sources and paper thin evidence would seriously compromise the credibility of your claims. The bottom line is that 9/11 was used to justify the so-called "war on terror", and no amount of scapegoating would change that.

Posted by Pedro Magalhães on 2013-05-14 12:46:38

Did the drone strike kill/injure ONLY "its target?" Or might there have been some "collateral damage" as well?

Posted by Jett_Rucker on 2013-05-09 12:29:14

the passage is inspiring.

Posted by catford on 2013-05-09 04:22:53

Not very sure about you rebuttal. Terrorism is terrorism regardless of who committed it or committed against. His writing is reflecting the past and present injustices committed against nations and nationalities in the name of ..... Go read the article again.

Posted by iamafreeman on 2013-05-05 22:10:49

Cicero----- Unfortunately, your statement is exactly what Chomski is discussing, the actual reason that this article is so badly needed. While (I certainly hope) we all are doing we can to help the innocent folks hurt in Boston, and that we all condemn this kind of killing, what Chomski is, (correctly, in my opinion), stating is that there are thousands in the middle east that are responding EXACTLY like you, only from the other side.

"Don't you understand," they are shouting, "it is the USA that has come to our nation & are killing our innocent families with drones, who are assasinating tribesmen and bringing war & destruction to us. US state terrorism has murdered millions, supporting illegal coups, torture in Latin America, murdering thousands in Vietnam, Laos, etc, & supports extreme right wing regimes against the people everywhere."

BOTH SIDES ARE CORRECT (& WRONG)!

Yes, our people were murdered! Yes, their people were murdered! But WE can certainly not say that once we know what our govt is doing, IN OUR NAME, illegally, immorally to innocents in other nations, we do not have the moral high ground. We MUST stop the killing in our name, in order to be able to stop the horrible killing now coming home!

Posted by bruce bostick on 2013-05-05 17:02:36

This is the man who said it didnt matter if 911 was an inside job. (Does he know that personal incredulity is a logical fallacy? apparently not) Here professor, please take a good, close, and careful look: http://smu.gs/L1p7XU

Posted by winston on 2013-05-04 01:14:46

Your argument is so articulate. I also admire your grammar.

Posted by Shannon Oakley on 2013-05-03 21:11:21

Chomsky is an idiot. What's tragedy we can throw him in Pakistan

Posted by Jenny on 2013-05-03 18:30:55

You completely contradict yourself in only a few sentences. Well done.

Posted by a__________________z on 2013-05-03 16:14:46

When did the U.S. declare war on Yemen? Yemen, or Somalia, or Pakistan, or Afghanistan, or Iraq, or Iran, or Syria, or Libya, or Mali do NOT threaten the survival of the U.S. as Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan did in 1941? "Collateral damage" is despicable, Orwellian doublespeak for civilian casualties. The U.S. has invaded and bombed dozens of countries since 1945, without declaring war on any of them, but this U.S. State Terrorism has killed millions of people since 1945. Since World War II, civilain casualties are unavoidable due to the power of modern weaponry. So war is now terrorism with a bigger budget, and the world's biggest terrorist is the United States.

Posted by Ed Ciaccio on 2013-05-03 15:53:20

American drones killed 2,200 civilians in Pakistan, including 168 children

Publication time: 13 August 2011, 14:01

2,200 to 2,800 people were killed and more than a thousand injured in American drone attacks on Pakistan in 2004 to 2011. At the same time, it was disclosed that only 126 Mujahideen were killed in these attacks.

A new study conducted by London-based Bureau of Investigative Journalism has also disclosed that up to 168 children have lost their lives in more than 291 attacks since they started under Bush. (DURING THE 8 YEARS OF THE BUSH ADMINISTRATION THERE WERE 54 DRONE ATTACKS...DURING THE FIRST 3 YEARS OF THE OBAMA ADMINISTRATION OVER 240++)

What a pile of left-wing B.S. If Noam Chomsky does not know the difference between killing a known enemy combatant and terrorism, which consists of randomly killing civilians, he does not belong at MIT. Ok, so the terrorist lived among civilians,. Nobody believes that those civilians did not admire and like--even fight for--the terrorist. They didn't throw him out, did they?

Collateral damage occurs in wartime. In WWII the US Army 8th Air Force killed 600,000 German civilians. There hasn't been any German aggression since.

Posted by Cicero on 2013-05-03 14:45:23

I think what he was saying is not that America is more to blame than the taliban. Just that the predicable effect of using immunisation as a cover to find Osama bin Laden is that it will lead to distrust of immunisation and foreigners. It is not more complicated than that.

Posted by well.... on 2013-05-03 01:36:09

I greatly admire Noam Chomsky, but blaming the U.S. for harming the efforts to eliminate polio is writing with blinders and ignoring recent history. It is as if Noam Chomsky is saying that ignorant religious fanatics can prevent goodfrom being done, because “everyone knows” it is all the fault of the U.S. Whyis he not putting the blame where it belongs; ignorant religious fanatics!

TheTaliban and related “religious” groups have always found excuses to justify their hatred. Several years ago, before any U.S. involvement, ten members of an international assistance mission were killed. The team included six Americans, one German, one Briton and four Afghans. The Taliban claimed "credit" for the murders. One Taliban leader said, "We don't want any foreigners here. They are not our friends." This is despite the fact that four of those killed were Afghans, and one of the Americans was an ophthalmologist who had spent thirty-one years in the region, bringing sight to thousands of impoverished villagers.

The Taliban leadership is filled with hate, but they are not completely ignorant.They know that polio immunization drives have no connection to anything otherthan humanitarian efforts. The awful truth is, they don't care!